I often watched him. Toward midday I left my goats and climbed up the pass where there was a breeze, and there I ate my lunch. To be honest, I spied on him, for I was careful to remain hidden.
According to his children, who had left home, he was a tyrant. And what tyrannized them, apart from his orders, was his indefatigability.
Go fetch them over! Go take them over!
Every afternoon he had a different plan for where and how his herd should eat. He never left them in peace.
There were always jackdaws around the pass. When the sun was out and they were flying close to the rockface of St. Pair, their flying shadows were cast on the rock, and this seemed to double the number of birds in flight. Then, at a given moment, the leader of the flock would veer toward the sun, the others turning to follow, and their shadows would immediately vanish, so that it looked as if half the birds in flight had suddenly disappeared into thin air. Sometimes I lay there watching the birds appear and disappear until I lost all count of time. I would look down and notice Marius and his herd by the stream below where the cows drank at midday, and the next moment they were five kilometres away.
A week later Danielle visited Marius again. He was with his herd near the forest where two generations before some shepherds had mined for gold and found none.
Marius greeted her by saying: One day you’ll be an old woman! Even you, Danielle! I had a fall last night.
So?
Everyone ages.
How did you fall?
By way of an answer, he started to undo his belt. His trousers, caked in mud and cowshit, drenched and dried in the sun a thousand times, were, as usual, unbuttoned in front. Now they fell to the ground around his ankles. He turned so that she could see the back of his thigh, where just under the buttock something sharp had jaggedly torn the flesh. His legs were as white as they must have been in the cradle.
Is it deep? he asked.
It needs cleaning.
It bled like a pig.
What did you put on it?
Some brandy and some arnica.
It needs washing and bandaging, she said.
What is it like?
It’s about ten centimetres long and it’s red like a wound.
Is it ugly? It’s just where I can’t see it.
It’ll heal so long as you keep it clean.
Everything heals unless you die from it!
There were flies all round the brim of his hat.
Let’s go to the chalet, she said.
The bowl from which he had drunk his coffee and eaten his bread was still on the kitchen table.
Living by myself, I don’t have to change the plates, he said.
Where did you fall?
Out there where the woodpile is. Every night I cut the kindling wood to start the fire next morning. I must have tripped, I don’t know how.
You do too much, Grandad.
Who else is going to do it? Do you know how many cheeses I make a week?
She shook her head.
Thirty.
You’ve got a son down below.
He’s only interested in becoming Mayor.
He’ll never get elected.
I’ll make you some coffee. He plugged in an electric coffee grinder. I couldn’t manage without electricity, he said, electricity can replace a wife! He winked. A grotesque, undisguised wink.
She sipped the coffee. A few drops of rain began to fall. Within a minute the rain was beating on the roof like a drunk, and there were claps of thunder.
You’re not frightened, Danielle?
She repeated what she’d often heard said: there are three sorts of lightning—the lightning of rain, the lightning of stone, and the lightning of fire—and there’s nothing you can do about any of them.
The cows won’t move in rain like this, he said.
When the thunder was further away, she said: If you lie down, I’ll clean your leg.
The chalet, apart from the hayloft and stable, consisted of two rooms, one without a window for storing the cheeses, and one with a window for everything else. The bed, in the opposite corner from the stove, was made of wood and was screwed to the wall. He climbed up onto it, handed her a bottle of eau-de-vie, turned his back and lowered his trousers. Pinned to the planks of the wall beside the bed was a colour photo, torn from a magazine, of a large political demonstration by the Arc de Triomphe. She poured some eau-de-vie onto a cloth and began cleaning around the wound.
Crowds there that day, she said, looking at the photo.
I cut it out because I knew the Arc de Triomphe, he replied, I knew it well.
As a young man, she thought as she took hold of his leg, which was as pale as a baby’s, he must have been unusually handsome, with his dark eyes, his thick eyebrows, and his jet-black moustache. In Paris he couldn’t have lacked offers from women. Yet if he was to remain faithful to his oath, he could not afford to marry—whatever else he may have done—a seamstress or a florist. He had to find a wife who could milk the cows he was going to buy.
He clenched one fist.
Am I hurting you?
Hurting me? Do you know what happened to Jesus? Jesus was nailed to the cross, with nails through his hands and through his feet, right into the wood. That is how he was hurt. And he wasn’t a sinner like me!
He didn’t marry until he came back to the village. Elaine, his wife, died young and the day after her funeral he bought a milking machine.
Danielle poured a little eau-de-vie into the wound, and then she took the new cheesecloth that he had given her and began to bandage the thigh. In order to do so she had to bend over him and pass her hand several times between his legs near his scrotum, and each time she did this she shut her eyes out of respect.
I would like to go to Paris, she said whilst bandaging him. Up to now I’ve never had the chance.
Just wait a little longer, Danielle, you’re still a young woman and one day you’ll go to Paris and Rome and New York, I daresay. People fly everywhere now. You’ll see everything.
He swung his legs off the bed and winced a little.
Is it too tight?
Perfect.
He pulled up his trousers from his ankles and fastened his belt. He had kept his hat and boots on throughout the operation.
The storm was over and everything was washed and dust-free. Even the air. The valleys below, leading to the snow-capped mountains in the east, looked as if they had been painted by a miniaturist thousands of years before. By contrast, the rocks with moss, the grass and pine trees at Peniel looked new, as if just created. Marius’s mood had changed with the atmospheric pressure and his eyes were full of laughter.
Come and help me bring the herd in! he said. No, don’t protest, you can leave us at Nîmes and cut across by the arolle tree to the pass.
They walked with the dog along the edge of the pine forest. At one moment Danielle left the old man to make a detour to a hollow where you can find mushrooms called the Wolf’s Balls. They are only good to eat when young. When old they turn to dust.
As she rejoined him, Marius said: You are as fearless as a ghost, Danielle.
A pity, she replied, ghosts aren’t happy.
Happiness! He spoke the word as if it were the name of another of his disagreeable cows, like Violette. Happiness!
Fetch them over! Bring Marquise over!
Nobody is happy, he announced. There are only happy moments. Like this one now with you.
The herd was easy to assemble that evening and the two of them had no more to do than follow the cows, who were going home fast, their necks moving up and down like pump handles and their bells ringing wildly. It must have been the massed bells which put the idea of glory into Marius’s head. Glory doesn’t last! he shouted. But he shouted it laughing, waving his stick to the music. Glory never lasts!
On her way home, Danielle turned around. Marius had put his hat on his stick and was waving it above his head in wide circles. She waved back and continued waving until she disapp
eared behind the last boulder.
In the afternoon when the cows were chewing the cud, Marius would lie down on the grass, take a newspaper from his pocket, read it for ten minutes, and then fall asleep. I had noticed this several times when I was spying on him from the pass at St. Pair. One day I visited him whilst he was sleeping. As I approached I made a bet with myself that I would take the newspaper out of his hand without waking him. The difficulty was going to be the dog. I would have to deal with Johnny.
The two of them were side by side, sheltered from the sun by sweetbriar bushes. The dog was wagging his tail, and I beckoned him to come. The old man was still asleep. He was on his side, his knees slightly drawn up, his hat over his ear. His head rested on a stone covered with moss. In his throat Johnny was moaning a little with pleasure. I gave him my sleeve to bite on. One of his hands lay, palm uppermost, on the grass—he had unexpectedly long fingernails. The newspaper was against his stomach where his belt held up his gaping trousers.
All the cows were lying down. There was no chorus of bells for they were too still. Just one bell rang, as one cow slowly turned her head, followed, after a pause, by another. It was as if everything had slowed down like the old man’s pulse whilst he slept. I bent down and took his newspaper. It was easy. I had won my bet. Now why should I wake him? So I left the paper on the grass and very lightly I touched his open hand because I did not want to leave furtively. I touched his palm with my fingers, as lightly as if with a feather.
Why don’t you get a husband? Marius asked Danielle the next time she visited him.
I’m in no hurry.
You won’t marry a boy from the village.
Why shouldn’t I?
Because you are too independent.
Is that a fault?
Not if you have enough money!
I shan’t get rich looking after Papa’s goats.
That’s not your job in life.
Are you saying I’m lazy?
No. I have a considerable admiration for you. The old man spoke formally as if making a speech. A considerable admiration for you, Danielle. You are clever and you are thoughtful—you let sleeping men lie!
It was then that she knew he had been feigning sleep. He must have felt it when she touched his hand. And he knew that she knew, but they did not speak of it.
So the weeks passed and so they learnt more about each other.
One night at the end of July a little before dawn when it was still dark, a car drove uphill, over the grass, towards the Tête de Duet and stopped a hundred metres away from Danielle’s chalet. The car was a 1960 Mercedes Berlin-18, and it had been painted silver grey with a brush, not a spray gun. Six men got out of the car, each with a sack. They were careful not to slam the doors. The eldest, who wore a beret and a leather waistcoat, placed a huge hand around the neck of the youngest, who was yawning.
All the best things in life before you, boy!
Cut it out!
Do you see that peak? No, not that one. The one with snow on it, that’s where we’re felling today.
Christ! It’s a good ten kilometres away.
The other five burst out laughing. Once again the boy had been taken in. Because it was early and the air was cold, laughing made some of them cough.
And it was this coughing which woke up Danielle. By the time she got out of bed and pulled on a skirt, all she could see from the door in the first light was an Indian file of men with sacks over their shoulders climbing towards the forest at St. Pair, and, before the chalet where her goats grazed, the shadowy silhouette of a car.
Later she tried each of the car’s four doors. They were locked. Through the windows, which looked bullet-proof, she admired the leather upholstery and the wooden dashboard of teak, with its dials like those on instruments made specially for doctors.
Afternoons she let the rabbits out of their cage. That day, after they had eaten, they hopped under the Mercedes, happy to find shade there. When she half-shut her eyes the rising heat waves along the ridges of the mountains opposite formed a blue halo. All day she heard the drone of the woodcutters’ chain saws.
In the evening, through the little window of the chalet, she watched the same six men with sacks over their shoulders coming down from St. Pair. The light was already fading. They were walking slowly, as if they were blind and were forced with each step to feel their way forward with their feet. They had a dog with them whose antics they were too tired to notice. Slowly they approached the chalet, each walking at his own speed, exhausted and alone.
When they saw her in the doorway, they became a little jauntier. The first sight of a woman—with the prospect of nine hours’ respite from their backbreaking work—was a reminder of the other sweet side of the world.
I heard your saws.
Forty heads, miss.
Father’s the one who counts, said a thickset one with sawdust in his hair. They all laughed and then fell shy.
You think it’ll rain? one of them asked.
No, the birds are flying high.
Not tomorrow.
Forty!
Forty of ’em, shining like fish!
We strip ’em as we fell ’em.
It’s steep, your Pair.
Pair? That’s how you call it? asked the thickset one with sawdust in his hair.
St. Pair, she said.
Everywhere, on their arms, faces, vests, shoulders, they were smeared with a grey dust stuck to sweat and resin. This covering was so thick that in the half-light it looked as if their faces were covered with fur.
Steep and hot, said the boy.
In the trough there’s running water, she said.
The men turned to look where she was pointing. A little distance from the chalet was a massive, scooped-out tree trunk, placed horizontally on some stones. In front of it waddled four geese, phosphorescent in the half-light, and above the trough was a water pipe which came directly out of the grassy mountainside behind.
It’s a spring … if you want to wash.
We’ll be home in twenty minutes, said the one they called Father, who wore a beret and a leather waistcoat.
Home?
The geese came towards the house in single file, breasts stuck out.
We’re sleeping in the Chalet Blanc, explained Father.
There’s no spring there, she said, only rainwater.
We’ve got jerry-cans.
Wash there, it’s a spring, she said, a spring that never stops. You got soap?
Sure—and pyjamas! said a tall one.
In that case, I’ll get you some.
She went inside. When she came out she handed a large cube of soap to Father. The men left their sacks on the ground and went over to the trough, which was long enough for them to stand side by side.
In the early night breeze she could smell the smell of their washing: a mixture of soap, stale shirts, petrol, smoke, pine resin, sweat. She observed them, stripped to the waist. The backs of the younger ones were suntanned. The elder ones always wore vests and their backs, in contrast to their arms and shoulders, were white. The Father had taken off his beret. They were throwing the soap to one another and laughing. They found the two brushes she kept there for scrubbing the churn. A woman, she thought, washes herself quite differently from a man; a man washes his body like he washes down a wheelbarrow; it’s not by washing himself that a man learns to caress.
By the time they had put on their shirts it was dark. Under the eyes of Father each of them solemnly shook Danielle’s hand, thanked her, and pronounced his name. The name she remembered was that of the thickset one with sawdust in his hair. When he arrived he was the dirtiest, and she sensed that this was because he worked the most ferociously. Pasquale was his name.
They dumped their sacks in the trunk of the Mercedes. Four got in behind. Father sat in the front, and Pasquale was the driver. He sat behind the wheel, hunched up, concentrated and impossible to distract.
Every night on their way home the woodcutters stopped to wash
themselves in the trough by Danielle’s chalet. She prepared coffee. They drank it outside sitting on their sacks. Virginio, who was tall and wore glasses, left a razor behind so that he could shave if he wanted. Danielle found a piece of broken mirror which she hung on a wire by the trough. She learnt that five of them came from the same village on the other side of the Alps, near Bergamo. Alberto came from Sicily. Every winter they returned home. She learnt that they were paid by the cubic metre of wood felled: the harder they worked, the quicker they earned. Father did the cooking. The Mercedes belonged to Pasquale.
Sometimes, when they passed in the very early morning they left a present for her: a tin of peaches, a bottle of vermouth. Once they left a scarf with a design of roses printed on it.
The first time I saw Pasquale out of his work clothes was when he knocked on the door whilst I was drinking coffee one morning.
I don’t work on Sunday, he said.
You deserve a day of rest.
To do what?
There was a long silence.
Once we worked on a Sunday and I had an accident.
What happened? I asked.
The trees were falling badly, one after the other. We weren’t working fast enough. That’s why we decided to work on Sunday.
Would you like some cider?
He shook his head.
Some eau-de-vie?
I’m not thirsty.
I’ll whip you some cream, I said.
His thick lips smiled and he opened his enormous hands in a gesture of submission.
Tell me what happened while I whip the cream.
A long silence.
About the Sunday you worked? I prompted him.
The very first tree I had to strip had fallen badly. Where we were working was very steep, like here. Rocks everywhere. Crevices. Gulleys. I told myself I’d work toward the head, so as not to have to walk back along where I’d already stripped. They’re as slippery as fish when you strip them. Sometimes the resin splashes your face when you are axing the bark off.